How Your Work Wardrobe Could Impact Your Performance

You already know the importance of dressing smart for a job interview or when you ask for a raise. In many companies, that means a suit, nice heels, and a carefully coifed ‘do. Indeed, research shows that dressing for the job has big payoffs. According to studies, when women wear more masculine clothing during a recruitment interview, they’re more likely to be hired, and when they dress provocatively, they’re perceived as being less competent.

Now, research published in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology suggests that what you wear not only influences potential employers, but it also alters your own behavior. For the study, Hajo Adam, Ph.D., a visiting assistant professor of management at Rice University, and his colleague, Adam Galinsky, Ph.D., tested whether a white lab coat—a garment typically associated with high-level, scientific thinking—could trigger particular behaviors.

The results were striking: Study participants who wore the white lab coat consistently outperformed those who wore regular clothes, making about half the mistakes on attention-related tasks compared to those without the auspicious garb. A second experiment found that the symbolism of the lab coat also played a role in participants’ performance. The participants who believed they were wearing a doctor’s coat performed better than the participants who thought they were wearing a painter’s coat.

"Our research suggests that clothes influence our cognitions even when nobody is watching," says Adam. "So the types of clothes we wear when working alone and from home might very well have an impact on the quality of our work." Importantly, he points out, it depends on the meaning you associate with a particular item of clothing. If your favorite PJs signify sleep, you may feel like winding down as soon as you step into your “jammy pants”—so don’t wear those while you make a business call. Similarly, if you think of a suit or business dress as professional attire, wearing those types of clothes might help you take a more rigorous approach to your work.

The participants who believed they were wearing a doctor’s coat performed better.

Experts agree that it’s hard to tease out what comes first, the choice of clothes, or the state of mind, but Adam’s research seems to show that your mood can catch up with your outfit. In the sports world, for example, decades of research has demonstrated a link between uniform color and players’ behavior. "Studies have shown that professional sports teams wearing black uniforms are more aggressive than sports teams wearing other colors," notes Adam. "So it’s possible that wearing black clothes puts one in an angry state of mind and makes one act accordingly."

Researchers have no idea how long the effects of wearing a certain type of clothing last. "It’s possible that people get used to what they’re wearing and the effect wears off over time," he says. In the meantime, Adam’s latest research confirms that wardrobe-related behavior change isn’t just the result of a pre-existing mood or a reaction to the response of passersby. It could very well dictate how you behave—and how much you accomplish—throughout the day. As for tomorrow’s 8 a.m. conference call? You may want to rethink the slippers and slip on a pair of pumps instead.